Johnny Weir as commentator at US Nationals

Well Mens SP is on and I am just loving Johnny Weir as a commentator. So relaxed, articulate, and insightful.

I don't generally enjoy commentating because I find it takes away from the performances... whether the passioniately hyper or insipidly simple.

Tonya, by comparison to Johnny, struggles to come up with something meaningful to say and instead delivers only the obvious and in a way that I think either insults the listener's intelligence or the skater's skating. Take the commentary on Jonathan Cassar...Tonya said that because he only has a double axel he has to work extra hard on other elements to make up for it, but Johnny pointed out that while the program was a lesser degree of technical difficulty the program was one of the most proficiently executed. She sounds critical, while Johnny sounds like he is giving a thoughtful critique just like a protocol. And does Tonya even know the COP? She never seems to point out that there is a -3 GOE for doing less than the required rotations or not having the required combo...she just says something like "he will credit for that single/double but it will just be less points."

Johnny, you are a natural born commentator. Your comments are intelligent and celebrate skating. Bravo!

I was completely annoyed at first. The gushing over Adam Rippon was (and I'm a Rippon fan). But he has improved. I just wish he would talk less. I don't want to hear yammering through the entire program.

I was completely annoyed at first. The gushing over Adam Rippon was (and I'm a Rippon fan). But he has improved. I just wish he would talk less. I don't want to hear yammering through the entire program.

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I agree. Less talk. I would rather hear the skater's music than hear Weir make a pointless and silly comment about a skater's hair.

when johnny sticks to the skating comments he is great, when he thinks that he needs to tell us about hair, sparkles, "real hair" color, etc. that is I want him to stick to the skating and tell us what about the skating is good or why that makes it a great jump, spin, footwork sequence.

I want snarky comments about fashion, hair, costumes from FSU, where one can skim over or block them out if one chooses to do so.

when johnny sticks to the skating comments he is great, when he thinks that he needs to tell us about hair, sparkles, "real hair" color, etc. that is I want him to stick to the skating and tell us what about the skating is good or why that makes it a great jump, spin, footwork sequence.

I want snarky comments about fashion, hair, costumes from FSU, where one can skim over or block them out if one chooses to do so.

someone on twitter said that johnny congratulated one of the skaters on leaving priscilla?

jeez

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Not exactly. It was more along the lines of the skater left Priscilla and the move seemed to be working out for him and congratulations on a well-skated SP. I didn't get an insult to Priscilla out of that.

I think about half of his commentary is entertaining and/or insightful, but he needs to shut up and only talk about 50% as much as he does. And most of his comments are really about him. He might as well be asking "aren't I clever?" after most of what he says. But in there is some really great stuff. And I actually love the counterpoint between him and Tonia

Not exactly. It was more along the lines of the skater left Priscilla and the move seemed to be working out for him and congratulations on a well-skated SP. I didn't get an insult to Priscilla out of that.

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I thought it was kinda funny and definitely sort of a dig at Priscilla. Johnny is a master of the passive-aggressive doublespeak.

I noticed Priscilla didn't have any senior men at this event. Actually, any seniors at all in any discipline?

I loved his commentary, for the most part. He was honest, insightful, knowledgeable and downright hilarious. I literally laughed out loud several times. I wish he would cancel his comeback and commentate for IN full time!

Johnny is the only commentator who could yak through the entire program and I wouldn't care. Pink flowers and sparkles, eyebrows, honey badgers and insightful about the skating too... could listen to him all day!

I was pleasantly surprised by how sharp he was as a technical commenter, actually. For all his trash-talking and professed ignorance of COP, he was actually better at breaking down aspects of step sequences or spins that could affect levels, unlike Tonia. Better analysis of the jumps, too, which is something she goes on and on about, without always being very insightful. His comments about how Mroz just didn't trust the landing on his 4T, and then again on the 3A, reminded me a lot of what Dick Button said about how you don't "commentate" skating, you have to "narrate" it, create a story about what's going on for the audience. When he wasn't trying to show off how clever he was, I thought Johnny did an awesome job of that, and that's probably something a general audience can relate to more than Scott Hamiltons grunts, squeals, and incoherent babbling.